Boas

Natural History

Boas differ greatly from ball pythons and GTP’s when it comes to varieties and morphs. Common boas or Boa constrictor imperator, come in many different sizes and colors, even though they are all classified as the same species. Bci ranges from the Sonora desert in Mexico through the north eastern areas of South America. With such a large range there are many different locality boas that are distinctly different in appearance from geographic area to geographic area. Not all localities have morphs associated within that locality group.

The groups can be broken down to the island boas, the Central American boas and the common boa. The island boas are further broken down to the specific islands that they originate from and the Central American boas are often broken down to specific countries or geographic areas from which they originate. The largest, as in size and commonly kept, of the Bci group is referred to as Colombian boas. This group contains the largest group of boa morphs. It is possible for the females of this last group to reach lengths of up to 12’ with weights up to 40 pounds or more.

The dwarf boas which contain the island species and the other locality animals are considerably smaller. Many of the adult females in these latter groups will rarely be longer than 7’ with weights of around 10 – 15 pounds. More and more breeders are beginning to work with these smaller boas and as a result more and more morphs are appearing in the smaller boas. Selective breeding has also produced some very outstanding appearing locality type dwarf boas.